ESG isn't Woke
There has been the idea floating around the anti-Woke zeitgeist that ESG (Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance) is the main driver behind the phenomenon of large corporations becoming more “Woke” in their advertising and messaging. The main proponents of this assertion being Jordan Peterson and Adam Curry.
I’m writing to tell you that these usual suspects are once again victims of the distraction that is the culture war and simply haven’t done their due-diligence. It is, instead, far more likely the case that the wokeness seen in the initiatives of modern corporations is down to individual executives, hiring managers and advertising employees who are footsoldiers of wokeism.
Simply put, commentators have taken the “S” in ESG (“Social”) and ran with it, assuming this necessarily means that ESG scores are based on the social justice qualities of individual corporations. Making the false conclusion that this means that higher scores are awarded for initiatives such as Pride Month advertising or affirmative action hiring policies. This is in fact incorrect when looking at some of the substantive criteria by which ESG awarding authorities actually use when making their assessment.
Although ESG is not calculated in a centralised way I took one of the main reporting authorities (the one Adam Curry actually mentions!), SASB, and examined the standard by which they rate each corporate sector. SASB reporting is used by such corportate giants as Nike and Anheuser-Busch (Budweiser), both proponents of prominent culture war “controversies”. Advertising campaigns featuring Colin Kaepernick and Dylan Mulvainy respectively.
What I can tell you is that the SASB standards contain no mention of social justice issues (and particularly nothing to do with BLM or the transgender movements) for either the Apparel, Accessories & Footware or Alcoholic Beverages sectors.
What is more likely to be happening at these large corporations is that in spite of the lack of external ESG pressures in regards to “Woke” initiatives it is in fact individual executives, hiring managers and advertising employees who are pushing these subjects into the consumer space.
Ask yourself: are you going to risk your high-paying job at a multinational corporation to be a failed bulwark against the suggestion of an ideologically possessed colleague?
On SCHIZO.FM we took a deep dive into ESG over on YouTube: